I'm running the code on the ESP8266 that is on the device, so in theory I should just power the device, and it should load the code, and start switching the relay. I just wanted to do a simple test before doing anything else to ensure I could control it.

I did connect an FTDI to is while it was running and it did seem to be sending more that just those commands to the out. basically anything outputted to the console was getting sent too. Is there a way to redirect the console outputs to another channel that I can observe, whilst keeping the serial1 channel just for the comms to the module?

I did also try just sending the commands directly from my pc using some node js code, but I still couldn't get it to work at all.

I have a second relay module so might try that incase there is a fault with that one, but it just seemed very unresponsive.

Next thing will be to get it working as per the original spec as you suggest to make sure the board actually works!